


The Cadet Life

by mochipii



Series: Nanaba's Story [2]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Gen, One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-08-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:48:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,630
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25779997
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mochipii/pseuds/mochipii
Summary: Nanaba's life as a cadet.
Series: Nanaba's Story [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1978147
Kudos: 4





	The Cadet Life

Nanaba remembered the first time she arrived at the city was when the sun is setting. She's never been to the city before, only heard stories about them. The street is still full of people even when the sky is getting darker, very different compared to her village. She and the boys found some cheap inn to stay for the night. As they ate in the dining area on the first floor, they noticed that, in several tables next to them are also people from other villages or towns, coming into the city to enlist.

The next morning, she and the boys, along with other girls and boys around their age, found themselves standing on line in front of the Cadet Corps headquarters building. Several sets of parents standing a little away behind them, they're accompanying their sons and daughters to the most important chapter of their children's lives. When they were ordered to enter the courtyard and the main gate closed, she can see these parents lining up along the gate bars, seeing their children off for the last time in a while. A small envy feeling bloomed in her heart seeing those kids have their loving parents sending them off and waiting for them to come home someday.

They walked into a large hall to the left of the main building where they were told to form a line again. There, they were given a clipboard each with pen attached and a three sheets of form on the clipboard that they have to fill out. When all the clipboard were collected, the instructor came to the stage and begin to welcome and explain to them about the rules in a Cadet Corp. They were told that after this briefing, they will be directed to their barracks to settle in and after lunch their training will begin.

First training under the scorching sun. After what felt like an hour of standing in the field Nanaba felt like she's about to melt and tried to sneak a look to her fellow cadet member who doesn't look much different. Finally the instructor came and started to make his round around the lines of new recruits. She wondered, why the hell he must yell around like that? When he reached her he didn't yell at her immediately, but he asked her about the bruise in her temple, where the swell has subsided and replaced by a bruise. She told him that she fell down the stairs. The instructor scoffed at her answer and move on to the kid to her right.

Her days now filled with intense physical training, theory classes, weapons handling, hand to hand combat, exams. She went to bed every night feeling like her bones are broken into pieces and fall asleep immediately. She remembered that she didn't mind all the hardships of being a cadet. Her skin a few shades darker now, often she went to bed with sore muscles, bruises and cuts peppered her skin too, but she didn't mind them this time. She's grown to love them even, smiling to herself everytime she found a new one during her morning shower. Knowing that these bruises and cuts weren't the result of something that wants to hurt her.

Six months almost past and winterbreak is coming. Most of her friends are planning to go home to their towns and villages for two weeks. Nanaba wasn't really sure if she could just stay in the barracks for she definetely did not want to go home even though she has one.

The morning her fellow cadets leave the camp after breakfast, she waved and hugged her closest friends, wishing them to have a wonderful winterbreak. Apparently she's not the only one, there's at least a dozen other kids also staying in for the winterbreak. After expressing her surprise and chatting with them for a while, she made her way to her barracks when she saw her instructor coming from her opposite. Giving him the salute as he passed her. To her suprise, he wanted her to go with him to the library to help clean and do some inventory for the newly delivered books. Two more cadets already waiting in front of the library door when Nanaba and the instructor came, for the next three days, the three of them will clean, reorganize, making and updating the inventory of the entire library content. The instructor always using this once a year break time to rejuvenating the entire Cadet Corps complex using the cadets who choose to stay.

During lunch the instructor asked her about her bruised temple he saw on the first day of training. He asked if it was her father? brother? or uncle? Nanaba's quite surprise to find the instructor knew she was lying then and didn't do anything about it. She swallowed her food and quietly answered that it was her father. Their conversation continued with the instructor told her that every year, there's always a cadet like her, who probably joining the Cadet Corps to escape home. But he liked those kind of kids, because often, those kids make good soldiers, a lot of them adapt quicker to the brutal reality of a soldier's life because they already experienced and accustomed to brutality at home.

Nanaba found his words rather harsh, but later on thought that it made quite sense. She just realised that the other kids that stayed during the break probably have similar or worse experience than her, and they all seem to have come to a silent agreement not to ask each other the reason they're staying behind.

The task she enjoyed very much is the caring and help training of the horses. Just like their human counterparts, they were also cadets here and train alongside the humans as well. These magnificent animals are always a joy to be around, every one of them have their own personality and it's always a joy to discover any quirks on any of them.

***

It's new year already, snow is pouring from the sky and the cadets are on the endurance training again through the forrest. Sometimes they were only made to run for an entire day, sometimes they were given a mission to complete. Today, the cadets are made into four person group and made to run according to a specific route. Or so she thought. One of her group members stop them saying she heard something at the thick rows of trees to their right. When they are sure that they don't hear anything anymore, they commence their running when a giant titan dummy suddenly appeard from the left side of a massive tree. The group disperesed to each chosen tree, blades drawn. Nanaba being the closest to the titan dummy goes straight to the nape, dropping chunk of padded cushion to the ground. On the opposite side of the road, Marcus managed to avoid another titan dummy creeping from behind him, jumped to another tree thus giving opportunity to Greta to slice it's nape. Grouping together on one giant tree, they made sure to check on all direction for anymore titan dummies. Once they are sure that the coast is clear, they descend from the trees back to the ground. When suddenly another shorter titan dummy appeared and knock Greta to the ground. Thomas chased and pulled her to the side, away from the titan dummy's path and Marcus sliced it.

They manage to enter the training grounds as the sky grew darker and saw several other groups that arrived before them. Apparently if you were "caught" by the dummy titan, you're marked by red paint and recorded as dead. Of course group with most "dead" members, and especially the "dead" member will get the lowest score. Nanaba and her group smiled at each other knowing they all getting a high score this time.

***

Her first birthday in the Cadet Corps is quite bitter sweet. Her closest friends celebrated her birthday, she loved that, but at night her minds kept her awake. The memory that attached to her birthday, she hated that. After that, she managed to convince her friends to not celebrate her of her birthday anymore.

***

Nanaba remembered her last year in Cadet Corps. The cadets were embedded to various squad to various divisions, each for three months to gain real life experience and give the cadets a clearer guidance of which divisions they could go after graduation.

Two months to graduation. Everyone's conversation these days mostly around which divisions they would go. Nanaba hasn't really decided, even after the three months embedded to each divisions. She still have vague ideas on each of them, she doesn't really see her future self in any of it. She just smiled and shrugged everytime anyone asked her.

***

Now Nanaba is standing in line for the Survey Corps acceptance ceremony. Commander Shadis is on the stage now, talking about the glorious things the Survey Corps have done in the past and will achieve in the future. After a lengthy speech, he told everyone who does not want to achieve glory, to leave the courtyard. A wave of people went pass her as she stayed put. Her feet doesn't make a move. Her feet doesn't want to move. Which is it? She went into argument with herself as these people went pass her. Asking herself if she really knows what she is doing? if she is sure to want to join the Survey Corps? does she want to die? questions flooded her mind with her not knowing what or how to answer. When suddenly she realized that the courtyard is quiet. So quiet you can hear a pin drop. 

Commander Shadis roared his welcome to the new recruits, to the Survey Corps.

THE END.

**Author's Note:**

> This one shot can be considered as the follow up on The Beginning.
> 
> Hope you enjoy!


End file.
